FYI

COLLEGEVILLE — In our hotbed of pizza culture we have been chowing down happily for years on endless New World adaptations.

But the wood-fired beauty that Ciro Nuzzolese has just brought to the table is, he promised, the genuine Neapolitan article that could well reroute many taste buds onto the road to renewal.

The first bite of the Margherita Del Re, with its slightly charred, pillowy and delicately smoky crust, imported San Marzano tomatoes, Mozzarella di Bufala cheese and whispers of fresh whole basil leaves to set off its rapidly baked perfection tells you the owner of the recently opened Forno Antico Pizza Napolitana is on to something.

“I know there are many pizza shops around and I wanted to have a restaurant in this area that was like the ones we have in Italy and I wanted to make pizzas the way I used to make with my grandfather in Italy,” said Nuzzolese.

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The airy and bright Forno Antico, which is discreetly holed up sufficiently distant from the grind of Collegeville’s Main Street in the former La Fontana, is the third Pennsylvania eatery that Nuzzolese has run, and the one that has finally and utterly captured his long-held vision as a restaurateur.

Developing his culinary smarts by his grandfather’s side at the family’s Port Alba Antica Ristorant in Italy before emigrating to the U.S., Nuzzolese initially operated Alfredo’s restaurant on Route 100 in Bally, which is now owned by his brother, and then Gran Sasso restaurant in Perkasie for 20 years.

The locations and the timing in both instances converged to work against his hopes of introducing American diners to the true Neapolitan style pizza, Nuzzolese said.

“They were more like regular pizza shops,” he recalled. “I tried to do this kind of pizza at one time, but people were not responding like they are today. With the food shows on television, people have been well educated, and are now looking for the things we have here. They want authentic Italian food at an affordable price.”

When you enter the rustic BYOB trattoria with its striking yolk-colored walls, wood blinds and earthy vibe, it seems clear that fate is at last shining down on Nuzzolese’s dreams as brightly as a Tuscan “sole” on a field of sunflowers.

“This is such a beautiful building that I knew I could do a lot with the interior,” said Nuzzolese, who runs the restaurant with his wife Martha and spent several months renovating as the igloo-shaped brick oven that is the centerpiece of the dining room was being built in Italy.

The heat is as vital to the creation of Forno Antico’s pizza as the fine “double zero” flour that is not up for compromise in Nuzzolese’s kitchen — “It is a lot more expensive, but you can’t get the perfect results we get without it,” he said — and to that end the oven gets down to its torrid business at more than 800 degrees.

“It will bake a pizza in two minutes,” Nuzzolese said proudly.

Customers are welcome to call in their take-out orders, but the pizza is not baked until they arrive.

“It is worth waiting the two minutes for this pizza,” Nuzzolese said, smiling.

Although pizza is the headliner in its many intriguing variations, from San Ciro (sausage, roasted red peppers, mozzarella and cipoline; $12, $15) to Diavola (spicy sopressata, hot peppers, San Marzano tomatoes and mozzarella; $11, $14), the smartly multifarious menu can satisfy your average gastronome with elegant fare such as Flounder Portofina (flounder topped with spinach, crab meat and mozzarella in a white wine sauce; $18.95) as well as the hungry elbows-on-the-table soul who will steer clear of grandiosity for a hearty sandwich every time: the Forno Antico cheesesteak is 9 ounces of rib-eye steak dappled with velvety American cheese on a straight-from-Brooklyn roll, for an easygoing $7.

The Eggplant Parmegiano ($11.95) recently scored five stars and a rhapsodic review from one Yelper who raved that the dish was “not the usual breaded and fried eggplant. This was fresh non-breaded eggplant cooked to perfection in an extremely flavorful San Marzano tomato sauce. It truly was the best Eggplant Parmegiano I’ve ever eaten.”

Nuzzolese noted that his Collegeville customers are warming up to his bona fide Italian cookery just as he had hoped they would now that he has transitioned back to his Old World ways.

“It’s all done the old Italian way ... no shortcuts,” he said. “The more we grow, the more I would like to spend time in the dining room getting to know my customers and finding out what they like.”